UK company caught smuggling weapons-grade uranium to Iran

Britain's MI6 has made a number of arrests after discovering a plot by a UK company to sell black-market weapons-grade uranium to Iran and Sudan.

During the 20-month investigation, which also involved MI5 and Customs and Excise, a group of Britons were under surveillance as they purchased weapons-grade uranium from the black market in Russia. The uranium was reportedly intended to be shipped to Iran and the Sudan.

MI6 is also keeping a close eye on what's described as `a number of Britons, who are understood to have links with Islamic terrorists abroad' remain under surveillance, and British investigators believe that they now have proof that al-Qaeda has been actively engaged in developing an atomic capability. The British company has been `wound up', Britspeak for dissolved or ended.

Roger Berry, chairman of the British Parliament's Quadripartite Committee which monitors arms exports, said: 'With the collapse of the Soviet Union there was always the question over not just uranium but where other WMD components were going and how this could be controlled. Real credit must go to the enforcement authorities that they have disrupted this. The really worrying aspect is that if one company is involved, are there others out there?'

Gee, you think?

Another aspect of this is the ongoing diplomatic tussle over Iran's nuclear program. If, as the mullahs say, they're only developing a nuclear program for peaceful purposes,why would they need to buy black market weapons grade uranium and have it smuggled in secretly?

Another aspect of this that the Brits are trying to nail down, according to one of my sources across the pond is Russia's role in all this.

Did the Russian government know about this and simply choose not to bother about it? Were figures in the Russian government, or even the government itself involved? What else has gone out the back door that we don't know about? Is this part of the reason Russia is so adamant about any meaningful sanctions against Iran in the UN?

The Sudan's involvement is also interesting.

The country has a long history of involvement with Islamic terrorism and radical Islam, the Sudan is another country the Russians protect in the UN and Iran and the Sudan have a number of military and economic ties.

A Sudanese delegation visited Iran's uranium conversion facility in February, and the Sudan recently signed a mutual defense pact with Iran that involves Iran deploying deploy ballistic missiles in the Sudan.

Iranian Republican Guards have been openly seen in the Sudan operating as `advisers', and as Joshua's Army members are already aware, a number of Sudanese and Somali jihadis were recruited by Iran for Hezbollah and ended up fighting in Lebanon.